Chip Was Right
by pleadingthefifths
Summary: A one shot on how 6x09 took a toll on Abby, and when Chip shows up it doesn't help. Takes place between episodes. Trigger: self harm, alcohol dependence


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* * *

"I'm sorry for hitting you." It doesn't even sound believable, but it's genuine, the monotone voice doesn't help to match the affection in entangled hands where leading to a sobbing figure.

The audible cries have stopped, but internal ones remain. When she nods she means to say, It's okay, I've been hit for less.

Olivia knows it's not okay, but she doesn't say it. Tough love, that's what she calls it. The means will always justify the end, it has to. Right? Or maybe this has nothing whatsoever to do with justice, and a part of this woman slowly suffocating the person she used to be, just wanted the president's chief of staff to feel some fraction of what she felt. Betrayed, lied to, worried. To be punished for her wrongdoings the way she knows will work, the way she knows will burrow under her skin and marinate for a little while. To make sure she doesn't do it again.

Abby however isn't Abby anymore, not really. She's regressed into the same scraps Charles left in his wake, only she feels everything this time. There's no snow globe of unreality she can travel to this time.

* * *

Sleep is a pastime she's given up, she's given up Leo too, or the other way around. To add to the list, her boss has seemed to give her up as well.

"You're worthless." A phrase that has been used to strip away any power she had over herself, but when uttered from someone whose supposed to be her friend, it had her running to the toilet to empty her guts. The same reaction she had when she saw Charles again.

* * *

Working from home has her locked in a cage with thoughts she doesn't want and dreams of an abusive husband she can no longer avoid in her own mind.

The day she and Quinn makeup, the day she gets her family back, she goes to the bar.

"Abs!" The hoarse greeting is enough to send shivers down her spine and her bones to lock up, her shoulders tense and it is this familiar voice that jump starts her mind into another universe.

She turns her head to see none other than her ex husband, and if there weren't fog in her brain having her question if any of this were real or if she weren't stuck sitting down, she'd be out of there.

"Come on, Abs, don't be like that." He reaches for her arm but she pulls it back too quickly, her expression petrified across her face.

"I see you're still upset about what happened." He takes a seat next to her to which she attempts to scoot her seat farther. " I don't even drink anymore. My last wife got me some help, I've been sober for two years."

"That's good for you, Charles, but that has nothing to do with me." Her voice comes out shaky.

"But see it does, you see, out of all the women I've been with, my mind always wonders back to you." He leans forward, closer to the redhead. "I want you back, Ab. And I'm willing to do whatever it takes."

She's terrified, not sure if she wants to run or throw up, maybe both. She keeps silent, but then she remembers how silence always came with a consequence regarding him. "There's nothing you can do, Charles." Her head shakes as eyebrows furrow. "There's no way in hell I'm putting myself through that again."

"But you won't be, I'm different now. And I know you miss me, we made a good couple." He reaches into his pocket, which provoked a flinch from Abby, and pulls out a card with his number on it and passes to her, lithe digits accept it because it's easy, it's safe to just go along with what he wants. "Give me a call when you change your mind." With that, he sports a cocky grin and leaves.

It's been three days since she ran into Charles, and she hasn't left her house since. Meaning his ghosts hasn't left her cerebellum yet, and her hand hasn't left tequila along with the rectangular anxiety pill she swallows too close together between the hour and hours to come.

Huck makes his presence known with a clearing of his throat, and Quinn looks up which causes Charlie to do the same.

"Uh, has anyone heard from Abby in the last few days? I went by her house, but there was no answer and I didn't want to risk getting caught breaking in if she was there."

His gravelly question has the room wearing speculative expressions, until finally someone speaks up.

"I haven't seen her since the inauguration." Quinn doesn't think twice about it.

"Shouldn't we go looking for her? It's not like Abby to be gone this long."

"Huck, your overreacting." Her head tilts, and she shrugs a bit. "She's probably just enjoying her newfound freedom from having to chase down sweaty guys in suits all day."

"When someone goes missing you worry about them. We should go look for her."

"I'll call, Liv and see what she says. Then maybe we can go look for her."

* * *

The cellular device picks up the click clack walking from Olivia and her heels before her voice. "Make it quick, I'm busy."

"Hi, Quinn, how have you been? Oh, I'm good thanks for asking." The words she'd preferred had been said left her mouth instead of what she called for initially.

"Quinn, is there something you need, because if not I'm hanging up now."

Quinn has drifting to her own land before becoming refocused. "Oh, yeah. Huck keeps going on about Abby, have you seen her?"

"What's wrong with Abby?"

"She's missing apparently."

"Define missing."

"She's gone, no one's seen her since inauguration." Fingers run thrifty brown hair on the other end of the phone conversation.

"Did you try her house?"

"No answer."

"Did you try going in?"

There was silence on the other end, an easy question which obviously wasn't being answered.

"You know what forget it, I'll do it but it'll have to wait. Bye." Quinn is hung up on before she has to chance to mutter a syllable.

* * *

The fixer often finds her heart water - logged when it came down to it, to Abby, despite the way she portrays such affection, it's in a good way with butterflies in her belly. Then there were the times electricity struck the blue skies in her stomach and wrapped a fist around what beats inside and made a sponge out of her most valuable vessel.

The former chief of staff's door opens by the hands of Olivia, but a drooping head can barely lift itself up to focus.

You're worthless, you're worthless, you're worthless. Alphabets spoken when silver met skin unscathed. These were the syllables confidently spoken from a mouth that always told her the opposite, but it has to be true now doesn't it? If Olivia, the singlehanded person to help convince her otherwise, says so, it must be. Why on earth did she think she could be president? She was such an idiot. It clicked, her and Charles, she always felt she deserved the love he gave her, that she deserved to be beaten and with him around, she wouldn't get too big for her britches and try to level up.

There's vermillion fluid spilling from a pale wrist, an action she did in attempt to find some sort of peace though the knife would beg to differ. The majority of the liquid was dry across her wrist by the time Olivia walked in, a tiny pool underneath her wrist.

"Abby?" Olivia began to call her name, coming upon the woman buried under covers. One arm hangs off the bed and the other turns ivory blankets to maroon in a moment.

"Abby!"

"Abby." This time it's a breath, wide eyes catch sight of her and run toward the bed. She swore under her breath. "Abby!" Her hand takes her chin in an attempt to get her eyes to open at least halfway. "Abby, don't do this! Not now!" Olivia raises her voice, but her frantic movements checking the redhead don't cease.

The moan she receives lacks awareness, it was the sleepy kind.

"Abby, Abby look at me." Her voice becomes more stern as she grips her chin.

Nothing really come out like a word, but an undertone groan as eyelids flicker low. When her eyes close all together and refuses to wake when Olivia taps her, the people in the bedroom soon move to a hospital one, and Olivia's sitting next to her when sapphire opens.

* * *

Olivia's head rested in her elbow on the counter situated by the bed, it's covered in food she's sure Abby won't eat. Eventually, sapphire opens to a sniffle, but there were no tears to prove anything such as Olivia's head raised at the sight. There was a short period where a tear or two may have flew, but it was unseen and going to stay that way hopefully.

"Liv?" It's a dry cadence, chapped lips and a throat that feels all moisture has been stripped away by sandpaper. "What happened?"

"Oh, you don't remember?" She feigns blithe, false smile across her face as if this is funny, as if it's a joke. "You hacked through half of your arm and practically downed an entire medication aisle."

Somber took over Olivia with that sentence and it prompted a loss looking Abby to glance down at a wrapped up wrist.

When she looks up she's greeted with a fuming Olivia, to be expected.

"What the hell were you thinking?! You could've died, Abby!" The doctor said she was close to an artery but missed.

This wasn't the first time this happened, but it had to be the last. For Olivia, it had to be the last.

Abby doesn't even have a chance to respond before she's cut off.

"I can't keep doing this, Abby." At least her time is much lower now. What she really means is, she can't live knowing it's feasible that she'll wake up one day and Abby won't be alive due to her own actions.

"Liv—"

"You can't do this ever again. Promise me! Promise me you won't do this again." She switches between a gentle, loud and indescribable tone, all which leave Abby unnevered.

The redhead sees hands that have slapped her, will slap her and even worse hands that have done worse. "O-Okay, I won't, I promise." Her Hans raises subtly, unconsciously shielding her face just in case.

Olivia readjust herself and sits flat in the chair.

"Were you trying to kill yourself?" Furrowed brows ask a genuine question, head shaking.

"No, I just— I was trying to see if I was real or not."

Abby soon realizes judging on the confusion Liv wears she has to explain it.

Abby allows a sigh to commence first. "I saw Chip, and I can't figure out if that was real or not." She's looking at her nails, fingers fidgeting.

It's vague she knows, but she can't tell her about the dreams or anything else.

"What? When?"

"A couple days ago. It's weird, he actually seemed different. Like he changed." There was this longing look in her eye as she stared down.

"Abby you can not go back to him, you can not forgive him. He almost killed him."

"I forgave you."

"That's different."

"Is it?"

That was the question wasn't it.

"Abby..." She draws her name out. "What happened, what I did. You know I'm sorry for that, and I'm not going to do it ever again."

"Charles use to say that too."


End file.
